BJP national president Amit Shah, who attended a meeting of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) here late on Wednesday, is said to have discussed many issues with a top RSS functionary beyond midnight.
Sources told The Hindu Mr. Shah, who arrived for the meeting at Sanghaniketan, local headquarters of the RSS, at about 9 p.m. met for more than three hours with Suresh ‘Bhaiyyaji’ Joshi, sarkaryavah (national general secretary) of the RSS.
Ram Lal, national organising general secretary, and B.L. Santosh, national joint organising general secretary, of the BJP were also present in the meeting. The four met till about 12.30 a.m. on Thursday.
Mr. Shah and Mr. Lal again went to Sanghaniketan on Thursday morning and met Mr. Joshi for about 45 minutes. Mr. Santhosh was not present in this meeting.
Later, Mr. Shah left for Indore by a special flight at about 10 a.m. for an election campaign in Madhya Pradesh, sources said. Before leaving Mangaluru, Mr. Shah is said to have instructed the BJP leaders in Kerala to plan different strategies to exploit the Sabarimala issue in favour of the party in next year’s Lok Sabha elections.
Sources said that Mr. Shah instructed the party leaders to keep the agitation alive and also chalk out a different plan soon to fight against the issue.
Earlier, the BJP leaders briefed Mr. Shah on the six-day ‘Sabarimala rath yatra’ from Kasaragod to Pathanamthitta which concluded on November 13, sources said.
Meanwhile, the five-day ‘Akhil Bharatiya Karya Vibhag Pracharak Varg’ (meeting) of the RSS concluded here on November 15.
About 250 full-time RSS volunteers from Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Maharashtra participated in the ‘refresher course’ from November 11, the sources added.
Without attaching much importance to Mr. Shah’s visit to the meeting, a BJP leader said that it was customary for the BJP national president to attend the ‘prachark varg’ meeting on any one of the days.
The leader maintained that the State leaders of the party did not know what transpired in the meeting.
Mr. Shah arrived in the coastal city for the third time this year and his visit is said to be to continue his tryst with the RSS in view of next year’s Lok Sabha elections.
It is said that the RSS meeting has discussed about Maoist activities, conversion issues, Sabarimala and Ram Mandir issues.
